In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:

  • Brand New Spacesuit
  • John Gallaher (bio)

And maybe I’m not such a good person after all. And how does oneeven decide such a thing? The problem’s not lack of information,it’s too much information. Ancillary, distancing noise. What mattersis in there, somewhere, innate among the bayonets and office parties.Maybe it started when I was a kid, selling Christmas wreathsdoor to door. You get this feeling, approaching a house,whether it’s going to be a sale or not. And I was invariably wrong.That’s how intuition works. This truth is self-evident, like fashion.And in like fashion, I was supposed to shoot a cat once, a dying catthat had drunk antifreeze. Because antifreeze tastes so good.And I couldn’t. It’s that thing anyone’s supposed to doand I had this wooden finger. Even the cat, looking up at me glazedand dying, was asking me to do it. C’mon. Please. That’s not reallya measure of goodness, usually, more like competence, and howin some eras that passes, close enough, and then the eras change,such moody, flawed creatures. I’m looking out the window, January 1,2018. Snow. Negative 12. Full sun. It’s like a commercial, it’s so beautiful.Little diamonds scattered across a pristine expanse. It reminds methat there’s a film over everything. It’s how there are things,this repelling force that creates substance. I’m not actually sittingin this chair, I’m hovering over it, as it’s hovering beneath me.In a fancy world full of arrows and eros, two surefire ways to tellif one is a good person or not, what have you done with your arrowslately, your eros? We know things by their coverings in fundamentalways, how I have favorite outfits I love to wear, and someso favorite I never wear them, because wearing them is unworthy,any occasion wouldn’t do, as the possibility of a more appropriateoccasion would have to then wait for laundry day. It’s too muchresponsibility, our clothes, our lives, and yet here we are,stepping up. History’s a collage. At least that’s what I’m sayingright now, as I find these pictures in magazines that call out.They want another life too, and I can sympathize. It’s sucha difficult time. Like when I sit with my dog, talking, “I used to bejust like you,” I say. “And now look at me, all the way over here.” [End Page 8]

John Gallaher

John Gallaher’s forthcoming collection, Brand New Spacesuit, will be out in spring 2020 from BOA editions. He lives in rural Missouri and co-edits the Laurel Review.

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